1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to network management in a telecommunications system, and more particularly to network management functions pertaining to formatting and delivering performance data to higher layers in the network management hierarchy.
2. Related Art
FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a portion of a conventional telecommunications environment 202. The telecommunications environment 202 includes a first customer premises 204 and a second customer premises 208. The first customer premises 204 and the second customer premises 208 are preferably DS1 facilities. A DS1 facility is a telecommunications facility that transmits and receives DS1 data. DS stands for digital stream. DS1 is a circuit format having a rate of 1.544 Mbps.
If the first customer premises 204 and the second customer premises 208 are DS1 facilities, then they preferably operate according to the Extended SuperFrame (ESF) framing format. The ESF framing format provides a data channel through which performance data may be transmitted. Such performance data includes data relating to code violations and errors. The ESF framing format is well known.
The first customer premises 204 and the second customer premises 208 are connected to a long distance carrier 206 (for ease of illustration, many conventional components are not shown in FIG. 2, such as local exchange companies). More particularly, the first customer premises 204 and the second customer premises 208 are connected to conventional extended super frame monitoring units (ESFMU) 214, 226. The ESFMUs 214, 226 are connected to a long distance telephone network 224.
Each ESFMU, such as ESFMU 214, includes a west side 216 and an east side 218. The east side 218 is defined to be the side that is closest to the network 224. The west side 216 includes a port 250 and the east side 218 includes a port 256. The west side port 250 includes a receive portion 252 and a transmit portion 254. Similarly, the east side port 256 includes a receive portion 260 and a transmit portion 258.
The west side port 250 is cross-connected to the east side port 256. Specifically, the receive portion 252 of the west side port 250 is connected to the transmit portion 258 of the east side port 256. Also, the transmit portion 254 of the west side port 250 is connected to the receive portion 260 of the east side port 256.
Two cross-connected ports are said to be part of a bi-directional link. Thus, in the ESFMU 214, the west side port 250 and the east side port 256 are part of a bi-directional link.
The ESFMU 214 monitors and collects performance data from DS1 facilities that are operating according to the ESF framing format. Specifically, the ESFMU 214 monitors and collects performance data pertaining to the traffic received by the receive portion 252 of the west side port 250 and the receive portion 260 of the east side port 256.
The ESFMU 214 packages the performance data pertaining to two cross-connected ports into a single performance report. In particular, the ESFMU 214 places into a single performance report the performance data collected by the receive portion 252 of the west side port 250 and the performance data collected by the receive portion 260 of the east side port 256. In other words, the performance reports generated by the ESFMU 214 each corresponds to a bi-directional link.
The ESFMU 214 sends the performance report to a site controller 210. The site controller 210 forwards the performance report to a monitoring module 212.
It is important that the performance reports generated by the ESFMUs 214, 226 each include performance data pertaining to two cross-connected ports. In other words, it is important that the performance reports generated by the ESFMUs 214, 226 each include performance data pertaining to a bi-directional link. The monitoring module 212 expects to receive performance reports in this format. It would be necessary to substantially modify the monitoring module 212 if the performance reports were not in this format (i.e., if the performance reports did not each include performance data pertaining to two cross-connected ports).
The ESFMUs 214, 226, the site controller 210, and the monitoring module 212 represent components in a network management hierarchy. The ESFMUs 214, 226 are within a network element layer of the network management hierarchy. The site controller 210 is within an element manager layer of the network management hierarchy. The monitoring module 212 performs functions associated with a network management layer and a service management layer of the network management hierarchy.
The above description of the conventional telecommunications environment 202 shall now be restated in terms of the network management hierarchy. Specifically, in the conventional telecommunications environment 202 of FIG. 2, network elements (i.e., the ESFMUs 214, 226) in the element manager layer generate performance reports. Each performance report includes performance data pertaining to two cross-connected ports. That is, each performance report includes performance data pertaining to a bi-directional link. The performance reports are forwarded to element(s) (i.e., the monitoring module 212) in the network management layer/service management layer. These elements in the network management layer/service management layer expect to receive performance reports in this format (i.e., where each performance report includes performance data pertaining to a bi-directional link). It would be necessary to substantially modify these elements in the network management layer/service management layer if the performance reports were not in this format.
There are other types of network elements (other than ESFMUs) that are within the control of the element manager layer. Not all of these network elements in the element manager layer generate performance reports where each performance report includes performance data pertaining to two cross-connected ports (i.e., pertaining to a bi-directional link). When such network elements are used, significant modifications to the elements in the network management layer/service management layer are typically required. The need to make such modifications to the elements in the network management layer/service management layer places a great burden on the long distance carrier.